The biggest Wall Street news is, of course, Elon Musk’s buying of Twatter, the “town square” of social media .

“In order to secure the $12.5 billion margin loan on his Tesla shares, Musk gave a personal guarantee, according to Fortune,  Here’s what that means: If Musk can’t repay the loan by selling shares of Tesla, banks could take Musk’s equity stake in Twitter, his 46% stake in SpaceX, or any personal assets.”

Fortune Magazine

If Tesla’s stock falls below 40%, Musk will face a margin call.

In remembrance of our roots, I’ve enclosed a link to Corporate Investor’s Official Guide to Aircraft Registration 2022. But our business now is far removed from business jets and aircraft.

We tackle a world upside down where everything is stacked up against the honest and hard-working man. When I talked about the fraudster Elizabeth Holmes four or five years ago, there were only unicorns in the tech jungle of Silicon Valley. Now there’re talking about “dragons”, private companies valued at $12 billion or more, net of capital raised. Axios The current U.S. dragons are: Stripe, SpaceX, Instacart, Epic Games, Databricks, Chime, Fanatics, Plaid, OpenSea, Miro and Grammarly. China has six, led by ByteDance. Dragons also are based in Australia, the Bahamas, India, Indonesia, The Bahamas and the U.K. [Axios]

I truly believe those fleeced nvestors who put money into Theranos did so to the extent they did because the Founder was female. The company lost most of the $945 MM it raised from investors when it dissolved amid regulatory probes and civil sanctions in 2018.

It’s all water under the water at this point. Look forward to more and egregious frauds coming out of Silicon Valley.

Monday June 15th, The WSJ had an article “Negotiating that Raise or Promotion” (Tessa West) I will comment on today.

Unless you are self-employed, most of us today aren’t negotiating for raises, we’re “negotiating” for holding on to our jobs and not being axed in a crashing economy. Forget the raise -nobody is giving any raises, folks. I’m thinking 30% of investment bankers are going to lose their jobs in the next year or so – and they don’t even know it. Who goes out the door first ? Juniors, of course.

I said negotiating with your BB as in Big Brother. See, I call your boss the Big Brother. (of course I know the biggest brother we often use the word for is the government, but what are you going to call your boss, Little Brother ?)

The only way you’ll still have a job in the next few months is if you’re hooking up yours to your boss’s.

We’re not living in a normal economy. We’re living in an economy suffocated by incompetence and artificial status hierarchies.

Back to the article

Tessa West says you need to ascertain your boss social hierarchy status: “hierarchies constantly shift”. Of course they do.

“What does your request ‘cost’ your boss in social capital ?”

Tessa West

“What problems does your request solve for your boss ?”

TW, The Wall Street Journal

Oh ya, like you thought bosses are those little angels here to help people in need. You can read the rest of the WSJ article at your leisure.

Know this: the boss, BB (nice sounding name by the way, bee-bee), whatever, only cares about his/hers social (organizational) status. You either understand this or you don’t.

What have you done for me lately ? is the name of an old song by Janet Jackson, but it is also your boss’s OS.

There you go, Adam Galinsky, “getting inside your boss’s head”.

Here comes my 20+ years of experience dealing with bosses: a very confident boss is just as bad, or worse, than an insecure boss. Bingo ! (Please don’t make this quote into another meme, I’ve had enough of those already).

You need to bring your boss up the ladder of confidence or he’ll lose you faster than a speeding bullet.

With a very confident boss, and we’re talking C-level here, you need to get him out of the stratosphere and back to breathing though the face masks we’re going to be using around one another for at least some time. Unless you’ve discovered a Covid-19 vaccine, he doesn’t care about you.

Talking about Covid-19, remember: there’s no such thing as an “invisible enemy” (I know you’ve heard that term a lot lately.) Your boss is vulnerable no matter what industry you work in or how high up in the hierarchy he’s in.

Let him know the higher up they are, the harder they fall.

I wrote this Book, The Book of the Underdog for people like you, who’ve had enough of being pushed aside and away. After dealing with the wild card bosses are for a very long time, I gave you straight up the truth about bosses, careers, negotiations and lifestyle improvements. Written in 2018, BOU is still the Manual for handling your bosses.

Well now, after two months of quarantine and two dozen emails requesting it, I finally said yes.

A phone consultation with me can be booked from anywhere in the world (make sure you’re adjusting your time to mine – I am on Pacific Time Zone -America). You’ll be required to enter a payment method to secure your reservation.

Please use this Square link (also repeated below). You’ll pay a reasonable fee of $300 for a 1/2 hour chat -we do this over the phone but if you feel the need to share things with me such as documents (non-proprietary, please) we can use Google Docs, Dropbox, or conference apps such as Cisco WebEx, Zoom, Slack, Microsoft Teams, Google Hangouts— I use them all. Make sure you use the one app you’re comfortable that it gives you the highest degree of security. If we need further time together, another 1/2 hour for example, you will not have to pay another $300. This phone consult is on a sliding scale after half an hour, your total phone consultation cost will depend on how long we’ll be together depending on our schedules. A full hour, for example, might end up costing you $450 if we so agree. I will not cut a phone call short before fully explaining myself to you and giving voice to my concise opinion, giving you time to take notes. I’m not here to hold your hand, I draw on 20 years of “Senior-level” experience.

If you need to cancel your phone appointment, please do so at least 24 hours beforehand. Otherwise, you’ll be charged a late cancellation fee of $100. No-Shows get charged more: 50% or $150.

The topic/s we’ll discuss can essentially be whatever roadblock(s) you have in your personal and professional life.

Please be as specific as possible. While you can change names for the sake of it, it may be advantageous to you to use your real name because it happened to you and not “your friend”. Have a solid clear, chronological List of Events, just like you do when you go to a lawyer. (To be clear, I don’t give lawyer advice or opinions of law). Hire a lawyer for that one. Lawyers (some of them) are good at what they do. Relationships “therapists” and “marriage counselors” -they’re garbage if you know what I mean. Note: I don’t discuss or entertain any securities offerings or investment advice.

I specialize in low-hope, distressed and high-stakes situations. Career, personal life, geo-tactical decisions, “incredibly difficult” missions, reboots of life.

Because of the nature of my business, all information will be held in strictest confidence. At worst I’ll point you to the right resources. I’ll sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement with the folks who want it. If you decide to go forward and employ me to undertake a project for you, thereby taking advantage of my personal resource capabilities, you will sign a formal Compensation for Services Agreement which spells out my tasks and responsibilities, the services involved, milestones. and compensation structure (typically a fixed retainer with half of it due at signing, the other half after completion).

Book NOW: Confidential Phone call with Max Cantor

Since I am starting to test this service, readers will understand that I am not able to answer their personal email questions any more, although your thoughts and inputs are always welcomed in the comments here.

Thank you.

Max Cantor

Thinking of him I can’t help but see what years of indoctrination and submissiveness have done.

Who’s framing you right now ? Let’s see if we can get to the bottom of it.

I define as framing [you] anyone that creates a strong dependency. The frame they impose may be self-evident or may be less visible, subconscious. Who can you name, now, that is framing you ? Is it your boss, is it your wife or husband, is it your preferred elected official ? Who do you defer to -like an automaton, without even knowing ?  Some people call this framing “persuasion” – a silly term if you consider you haven’t even given consent. Perhaps a better term for it is manipulation, because the results are the same: you become utterly dependent on them, their life choices become your life ingredients, their cause becomes your own.

Let’s talk politics for a moment. If you are a strong supporter or detractor of, say, President Trump, then Trump -is pulling your strings. It does not matter whether you like or dislike him, as long as you fall “hook, line, and sinker” you’re there buddy, you’re sucking on that popsicle.

The list expands from elected officials to anyone who is an “influencer” in your life. Anyone with a “myth” of glory, virtue, whatever. Any outsized influencer.

I could have easily titled this “Who’s framing you ?” 

Whom do we make into “influencers” in our lives ? Let’s see, who in world love to be called influencers… Aside from politicians, these are bosses, CEOs , other “thought leaders” who so wonderfully share their visions.  These people have a vested interest to keep you in their sphere of influence, so you can garble on their awesomeness[sic]. In case you haven’t noticed, yes, I am being sarcastic.  Influencers can also be your own family, your wife, husband, anyone who has an outsize control on you.

Myths are repulsive. Especially myths weaved around CEOs.

Studies have shown CEOs are the category with the largest psychopaths in number. Not only that, but psychopaths are good for business.

“We promote them,

We elect them,

Without even knowing”. –CNBC

So wise advice is to slow down sucking on that empty sugar popsicle you call your boss. Stop sucking on popsicle Trump, or Sheryl Sandberg, or any CEO “action figure hero/heroine”. They’re sapping your precious strength ! Ass ponys !

Image: Gyphy.com

See the world for what is. The world is a stage where “beautiful people” garble on their garbage. The “beautiful people” -the “influencers”-stage coach their next generation of minions. Don’t be a minion.

Good news, partner ! I am developing a “Guide to Killing You Boss” [without inflicting bodily harm] In the next  6-12 months. I will give you the tools to successfully confront your boss, replace him, and lay him in the dust.  Stay tuned !